Fragments
by SomethingProfound11
Summary: A collection of Mass Effect writings not quite long enough to be their own thing, mostly from my tumblr.
1. You're Important Too

Ashley's helmet clattered against the armoury bench. Cortez and Vega had wisely vacated the area, perhaps feeling the bubbling tension building as the shuttle had rattled its way back to the _Normandy,_ scratched and dented.

Shepard looked up, eyes wary. She'd already taken off her helmet and the armour on her arms and chest, black hair slicked to her skull with sweat, every moment careful and lethargic. "If you break that it's coming out of your paycheck."

Her tone was casual, joking. Like it hadn't been barely twenty minutes since they'd been sitting in the bottom of the Kodiak, their visors pressed together, Ashley's arms around her shoulders, trying to give comfort through ceramic, trying to get her to breathe with her, saying _you're okay, you're okay, breathe with me._

"That was fucking nuts, Shepard," She gritted out, "You nearly died."

Shepard leant down and started undoing her boots, "It was a calculated risk. We needed Leviathan."

"It's like you don't care anymore," Ashley said bitterly, despairingly, "You've been taking stupid risks-"

Ashley knew recklessness, had often _been_ reckless before three years of war had taught her patience. Shepard, for all her carefully calculated risks, never had been. But Ashley had seen it in her eyes. The distant, fatalistic acceptance of a woman on the long march to the gallows.

"For fuck's sake Ash," Shepard snapped back, "I've been doing what I need to, for the war-"

"Is that all you care about anymore?" She demanded.

Shepard was suddenly close to her, arms crossed, eyes hard. "It's the only thing that matters."

Ashley searched her face. She found anger, defensiveness and little else. She wanted to grab her, wrap around her, say _you're not allowed to leave again, I need you._ But she knew that everyone needed Shepard since the War had started, that her saying that would be another chain around her ankles, another burden to bear on shoulders already carrying too much when all that Ash wanted to do was to take some of the weight off.

God. They used to know how to talk to each other.

"You matter too," She said sharply.

Shepard looked away.

Ash put a hand on her shoulder, carefully. Her voice was quieter but no less vehement, "You matter too."

The elevator door whooshed open and she withdrew her hand, taking a step, suddenly realising how close they'd gotten. Doctor Chakwas raised one grey eyebrow but then snapped into business.

"Commander, Vega told me that you were deprived of oxygen for part of your…dive," She said in that calming, professional voice that hinted at just a little bit of exasperation.

"Yeah." Shepard rubbed the back of her neck sheepishly.

"To the medbay with you," Chakwas said severely.

"Doc-"

"I need to check your blood oxygen saturation and do a brain scan," Chakwas continued blithely.

"I'll take care of your kit," Ashley murmured as she removed her gauntlets.

"We'll talk later," Shepard said at last, and let the doctor steer her away and into the elevator. Ashley's eyes followed them until the elevator door closed and then she sighed, turning to the piles of armour and weapons on the bench in front of her. At least cleaning and maintaining guns always calmed her - maybe the familiar actions would settle the churning in her chest.


	2. You Should See This

There were bags under Sara Ryder's eyes, lines of stress in the way she held her shoulders. They'd won, but it wasn't over, not yet. There were leaders to negotiate with, left over Kett to kill, arguments to resolve. And everyone came to the Pathfinder.

Vetra watched Ryder from the doorway to her bedroom in the Hyperion as her girlfriend bent over a datapad, frowning. At least Scott was awake and putting a certain sparkle in her eye. _He's my twin,_ Sara had said, _he's the other half of me._

"Hey you."

Sara looked up as Vetra came up behind her, resting her hands gently on tensed shoulders. Ryder smiled and let the back of her head rest against the front of her carapace. Meridian was peaceful, so they were unarmoured, unarmed and it still made the turian a little uncomfortable.

"You look stressed." Vetra murmured against Ryder's dark hair.

Ryder grumbled but leaned into the touch. "There's the rest of the Kett empire to worry about and everyone can't stop bickering."

For all Sara's SAMC career had been cut very short, she was still a military woman, with a military woman's preference for decisive action. She hated sitting around talking about something when you could be _doing_ it. Maybe that was why they'd gotten along, for all their differences.

"I want to show you something." Vetra said, kneading gently with her talons, careful to keep the sharp points about from her lover's skin.

Sara sighed, eyes fluttering. "I have a lot of work to do."

"Humour me, babe. It won't take too long, and you need a break."

Twenty minutes later they were away from the bustle of the starship metamorphosing into a city and alone in wilderness. Sara stared up at the cliff rising above them and shot Vetra an amused look. "You really like rock climbing, huh?"

Vetra flickered her mandibles. "...Yes. You should see this."

"Lead on." Ryder waved a hand. "Just spare some pity for us short people."

It took them a good half an hour to reach the top, with Vetra slowing down for Ryder ('I'm short! You have reach!). Sara took a moment to get her breath back, dramatically flinging herself to the ground, before she got to her feet and stared at Vetra with soft eyes, head tilted slightly.

"...Damn tall people."

Vetra felt a warmth in her chest. "Sorry. I'd try to get shorter but I don't think you'd like that."

Sara considered that. "Yeah, probably not. C'mere."

She stepped forward, dipping her head to press the plates of her mouth to Ryder's soft lips. Turians, as a rule, didn't do the kissing thing, but since that moment on Kadara, Vetra had come to enjoy it - the way Sara pressed her whole body closer, the way she wrapped her arms around her waist, the way she sighed soft and contently against her.

After a moment Vetra took a reluctant step back and pointed. "Have a look."

Sara turned and gasped quietly. Below them spread the tangled greenery, flashes of metal, sharp cliffs and gently hills as far as the eye could see. And in the distance, the hulk of the _Hyperion_ and an army of workers scurrying around it, small as ants.

"Holy shit."

"I found this place on one of my walks. I thought you'd like it."

"It's beautiful, babe."

Vetra watched the awe on Sara's face, mandibles flaring with emotion she'd never been good at expressing. "Sit with me for a bit?"

Sara nodded and they settled in the lush, emerald grass, the Pathfinder in her arms, back against her front, hand slowly tracing over the angular planes of Vetra's face; and they didn't need to say a word.


	3. No One Can Hurt Me Like You

Ashley made hot chocolate in the apartment kitchen, properly with hot milk stirred in. Shepard watched her from the couch, in between staring at her hands. She guessed she shouldn't be surprised by it - Ash was as much the big sister as she was the Marine, like a coin you turned over in your hands.

There were facets of her that time had sculpted into different shapes and, like in so many other ways, Shepard was playing catch-up. She felt _tired_. Tired of running when everyone else was walking.

Ashley set the cup in front of her. "Might seem silly…but Ma used to do this for me, when stuff was fucked up. I thought maybe… look, I know we haven't been getting along but I still care about you. I mean, we were close, you know? I wanna move past all this shit."

Close. Shepard remembered Ash moving on top of her in her dim cabin, the terminal painting her back in blue, her hands pressing Shepard into the mattress as she gasped against her mouth. She shifted and took a gulp of the hot chocolate, "I'd like that. I…fucked up, on Horizon. It was a situation I didn't really know how to deal with and I understand, you know? Everything you said. I can't say that I wouldn't say the same if our places had been swapped."

Ash sat down beside her, "I thought…look, coming back from the dead? It sounded to me more like you faked your death and hadn't told me. And I…cared, you know? It fucking hurt, to think you'd done that, to go work for _Cerberus_. I'd grieved for two years, to think that'd you'd faked your death, that you didn't care enough to contact me…"

Shepard nodded, sharply, taking another sip, "Those things you said, I…I'd thought of them all. I still don't know if I'm _really_ me." There was a lump in her throat but she forced herself on, to voice the words that'd stuck with her as she'd thought over Horizon again and again, "But I have to assume that I'm me because I broke ties with them."

Ashley reached over, her hand warm on her wrist, taking away the cup and setting it back on the coffee table, "You're you. I can see that now."

"I love you," Shepard said simply, the words slipping out. No more running. All the cards on the table. "I never stopped. I know it's been two years for you, Ash, but I've…I haven't had time to move on.'

"Shepard…" Ashley's voice was soft, her hand still on her arm. She tried to concentrate on something besides the warmth of her callused palm, full lips, eyes like whiskey.

"No one can hurt me like you can." Shepard admitted and Ash's fingers dug into her forearm, just a bit. "I must've read your email a dozen times, trying to work out what to say."

"You never were very good at emails." Ash said dryly. "I should've expected to get 'it'll be fine. Be safe.'"

Shepard rubbed the back of her neck sheepishly before Ashley's face went serious.

"We had something, years ago. Something important. When I saw you on Horizon, I know I said that I'd moved on but." Ashley shrugged, a little helplessly. "I'm still in love with you. Maybe that's part of why I was so angry."

Shepard tried to control her smile.

"I'd like for this to go somewhere." Ashley said at last.

"I can't imagine myself with anyone else." Shepard said honestly, folding a hand over Ash's.

She laughed. "Good, because I was starting to think I needed to buy a bat to beat off all the people throwing themselves at you."

Shepard shook her head affectionately. "Such a romantic."

"Don't you doubt it." She said, grinning and slid her hands to Shepard's collar. "Now c'mere."

"Yes ma'am." Shepard murmured and Ashley laughed in the moment before they kissed. She relaxed into it, the warm demand of Ashley's mouth, her hands in her hair, her weight in her lap when the Marine pressed her against the couch. There were still thing they needed to talk about, wounds that needed to be examined and bandaged with their mutual wish to move past their arguments and transgressions. But this was a good start.

A very good start, she thought, with Ashley nipping at her bottom lip and Ashley's hands on the buttons of her shirt, hot chocolate long forgotten.


	4. Rime

This was one of those times that First Lieutenant Emilia Shepard could admit to herself that maybe, just maybe, she'd made a Bad Decision. This wasn't the first time she'd been in a cell in her Marine Corps career, but it was the first time since she'd become an officer. Her company commander was going to tan her hide in the morning, but she had a sneaking suspicion he wanted any excuse to do so - he hated having a decorative platoon commander in his company just as much as she hated being one.

In the list of bad decisions she'd made since Elysium, this wasn't high on the list.

"So," she leaned against the wall, languid from the alcohol, "what's with the separate cell? When I was a Lance, they just threw me in the drunk tank."

The two Marine MPs looked at each other nervously. They'd worked out when putting her arrest into the system that they'd just arrested the 'Lion of Elysium' and they didn't seem quite sure whether to go all 'yes ma'am no ma'am' or treat her like any other drunk dragged in on a Friday night.

The answer, Shepard knew, was the latter, but that would make her night very boring. She liked people, liked talking to them, liked ferreting out what made them tick. Gunny Richardson had watched her speaking to the XO once, then called her a 'manipulative fuck, ma'am' but it'd gotten him the HMG lubricant he'd needed.

And then the stupid _fuck_ had pushed her out of the way of a blast of acid and took a shot of it to the side, like he didn't have a family to go home to.

"It's uh, policy, ma'am, with biotics." One of them said quietly, looking at her boots.

She smiled gently and the PFC promptly blushed.

"It's alright. You two are just doing your jobs."

"Yes ma'am," the other young Marine said with a smile that brightened his young face.

She was only twenty-four, but God, sometimes Shepard felt like an old woman compared to these young Privates and PFCs and Lance Corporals. War was fought by children.

Shepard was deep into conversation about their career plans and Private Ippolito's issues with his mother when the door to the cell block hissed open, followed by a heavy tread of booted feet. The two Marines went ramrod straight.

"Commander Anderson, sir!"

"Anderson," she said easily, swaying only a tiny bit as she came to the bars, "here to bail me out?"

He looked at her, expressionless, from the top of her messy curls to her pants, currently with a beer stain on one leg.

"Corrupting the enlisted, are we Lieutenant?"

"Givin' a little career advice is all, Cap'n."

Anderson ignored her, hands clasped behind his back when he turned his gaze to Ippolito, who looked like he wanted to melt into the floor, "Release Lieutenant Shepard, if you'd be so kind, Private."

"Aye sir!"

* * *

The apartment was still and silent when Emilia Shepard staggered her way in after fumbling through the lock. Fucking Arcturus. Why did they need key chits anyway? Couldn't they just biometric data or something? Arcturus was as close to a home as she had, but she was starting to think absence made the heart grow fonder. It felt like a box folded in around her these days.

Anderson's bag was on her couch as well as a - bucket?

"Made yourself at home, huh?" she mumbled, throwing her wallet onto the bench beside a take out container.

"You gave me keys, remember?" he said, shoulders still straight like he was on the parade ground.

"Right…yeah."

"Rita's worried about you."

She was half expecting him to say 'I'm not angry, I'm just disappointed' like he'd never cut loose in his time.

She blinked slowly at him. The room was still a bit…wobbly.

"Rita should be…you know worrying about her ship and crew! 'Cause they're deployed. I'm just…babysitting POGs,,,"

He shook his head and then moved -

Old bastard was fast and blood _strong._

The water was cold and sharp, like blades of ice on her face, and she was spluttering when Anderson hauled her out by her collar and tossed her aside like a bag of potatoes. Shepard hit the deck, still gasping for breath, curls stuck to her face. Then the anger rose, thick and choking, a red haze over everything. The rage she'd tried so fucking hard to beat into submission so she could be the good little officer, waiting to be allowed back out of the cage.

Shepard surged to her feet, carried by her anger and sudden sobriety, blue sparking between her fingers.

Fuck. This. Shit.

"Go fuck yourself," she hissed, " _Sir_."

Anderson planted himself squarely across from her, arms folded and his eyes stormy, "What part of this seems like conduct becoming of an officer, Lieutenant?"

She sneered, "You think I give a shit anymore, Commander?"

He frowned at her and it was like a punch to the gut - all concerned, disappointed father figure. She wanted to punch him for it.

"No. You don't get to show up here and judge me when you haven't been here!" Her voice was rising now. _No one was here, except Jules and Shay and they're gone now too._

"This isn't like you, Shepard," his voice was steel, said without words _you're acting like a child._ "you know Marines look up to their officers. You used to care about that - about being an officer your enlisted you could trust, count on. This isn't that - nor is the apathy you've apparently been showing at your duties!"

"My career is over anyway," she said morosely, "they cleared me just so they could have their fucking 'Lion of Elysium' in a cage to trot out in front of politicians. They're never giving me another N5 billet. They think I'm bad luck. That I got my Marines killed."

Something gentled in Anderson's expression. "Shepard. _Emilia_. You know that's not true."

She shrugged weakly. "Sure. But what happened and what people _think_ happened - that's two different things, Anderson."

He kneaded his forehead before he raised his head and looked her square in the eye, "You've been through a lot these past few years. Elysium, Akuze, now being stuck here. No one could blame you for reaching your limit. But Emilia, the one thing you can control in this life is yourself." He reached into his pocket and put a datapad in her hand. "Read it.

 _Interplanetary Combatives Training - Operator Training Course._

Her head shot up, a ember of hope fluttering into a flame. "Sir?"

"I'm not going to lie," he warned, "there's suitability tests before they even throw you into Operator Selection and if you fail their interviews you could find yourself back in front of a medboard. But get yourself cleaned up and pass that - and what happens after that is entirely in your hands."

Shepard tightened her grip on the datapad, wondered out loud, "N7?"

Anderson smiled, a flash of warmth and white teeth, "You've always aimed high."

She breathed out, squared her shoulder, "Alright, sir, if you're done re-enacting the Manhunt, I'm going to have a shower and get some sleep. I have some training to do in the morning."

He chuckled. "You do look like you're getting soft around the edges."

Shepard flipped him off over her shoulder.


	5. Folded, Unfolded

The bar was narrow and cramped, like it'd been hammered into place between two sections of Arcturus. Perhaps it had been. Either way it was one of the few bars on the station not frequented by military personnel, which made it perfect. No one would come looking for Captain Hannah Shepard here. No one would give their sympathies here, or tell her that her daughter was a hero.

The burn of the vodka down her throat was a candle to the roar in her chest.

She'd wanted to speak. Instead, she'd just sat there, as if frozen, while the brass turned her Jane into some kind of paragon of humanity, some kind of heroic statue to be put on a shelf and admired. Then the too young honour guard had folded the flag and pressed it into her numb hands.

She could still hear the echoes of the words Anderson had spoken. _Until the stars give up their dead._ She liked that thought. That one day Janey might sail back from those far stars, walk in the door with that half-smirk on her face. _Missed me, ma?_

Hannah took another drink. There were a dozen stories she could've told. Jane, ten and trying to sneak onto the flight deck on Czarnobog. Hannah had found out three hours later, after a sortie, and had gone running to find her daughter having a damned tea party with a huge, grizzled Chief sandwiched into a tiny chair, a cup held daintily in between his thick fingers. _Couldn't say no to that kid, ma'am._

Eighteen and defiant, chin raised. What'd she said? Screw the Naval Academy, something like that. She'd dropped out of high school and enlisted on her birthday, just like that - demanded the recruiter put her in on a guaranteed infantry contract. Told Hannah that she didn't need permission, she was an adult now, that she couldn't just sit there on Arcturus with so many fighting in the Traverse. Didn't she know three of Jane's classmates had already signed up? That was the trouble with spacer kids. Always rushing off to the recruiter in lots, egging each other on, thinking the infantry was some kinda big adventure. Hannah had been equal parts concerned, proud and furious.

Twenty-one, a Corporal, hands shaking as Hannah helped her do up her dress blues. Six other young Marines had gone home in those blues, in boxes. She'd been so worried that she didn't deserve the Star of Terra, that she was getting it just because she'd been lucky enough not to die in those last frantic moments of the Siege of Constant. Hannah had told her to keep her chin up and remember she was wearing the medal for all seven of them.

From the way they'd spoken about her, Commander Shepard had never doubted, never feared, never second-guessed - never gotten locked up for being drunk and disorderly, calling her mother at 3-fucking-am to bail her out because 'my First Sergeant is scary, ma!'

Couldn't say no to that kid.

"Hannah."

She looked up. "Karin."

It would be easy to reach for the comfort of formality. That was part of it, wasn't it? The solemn military rituals you could fall back on to show respect, honour, love, when all words failed. But here, there was only the two of them - the same rank, mourning the same woman.

Karin Chakwas eased herself into the chair opposite her. Her silver hair back in a bun, still in her dress whites with the rows of ribbons from a long career. It drew a few eyes from the freighter crewmen that usually frequented the bar. Hannah had known her for years and couldn't remember the last time she'd seen her in dress whites before today. She looked good. Poised. That had been what had drawn Hannah to her to begin with - her dry humour, her poise, her refusal to take any crap, whether from a Marine or a fighter pilot or a general.

At the time, she'd thought it a little funny. Her daughter and her (amicable) ex serving on the same ship? And they said the Navy was big.

"I can't imagine how you're feeling right now." Karin said and squeezed her hand. The sensation was far away.

"It was a beautiful ceremony."

And it had been. The honour guard had clearly drilled to perfection, each movement crisp with blank faces.

They sat in silence for a few long moments.

Then Karin said, firmly, "You should come with me. We're having a get together. The Normandy crew, that is. To remember who she was. I think it'd be good for them and for you, Hannah."

Hannah's lips twisted in a faint mockery of a smile. "Are you sure about that? I saw a few jumps when they read my name tape."

Like they were looking for the other Shepard. Their Shepard. Like reading that name had given them a flash of sudden, illogical hope and then they looked up and saw the wrong bars and the wrong face.

"They loved her," Chakwas said almost gentle, her fingertips warm on the back of her hand. "and she loved you."

Hannah tossed back the rest of her drink. "Fine. You're not going to just let me drink myself into a stupor, are you?"

The other woman smiled. "No."

"That's what I thought. Let's go then."

Afterwards, when Karin was walking her back to her apartment on Arcturus, along the long steel corridors splashed with green foliage and the streaks of colour as sky cars passed above, Hannah had to admit that she'd been right. It hurt but everything hurt - and this had almost had a sweeter edge to it. She'd gotten to see her daughter through her crew's eyes, these people who'd followed her to the end of the galaxy and into mutiny.

"Terrible driver, though," the turian Vakarian had said wistfully. There'd something hard in him that she'd seen before - all sharp edges like Hannah had been when her own Captain had died on Shanxi.

The old burn of anger about that war had faded into resignation. She couldn't find anything in herself that could turn that young man away, regardless of what army he'd served in. "You know...I don't think she ever qualified on the Mako."

"I knew it!"

"You were right." Hannah admitted as they started towards the lift up to her apartment.

"Of course."

She smiled despite herself. Her face felt like it was still relearning how to do that. "You've not changed as much as I thought you would have. Why did we break up again?"

Karin tucked a lock of silver hair behind her ear. "It was easier to say goodbye than try to hold on."

"The Alliance is a demanding spouse."

"I suppose it is. You never told her, did you?"

Hannah shook her head. "I didn't want to interfere in her command relationship with you. I tried to be hands off with her career."

Some people muttered, but everything Jane Shepard had gotten she'd earnt on her own. Her commission, her N7, her Star of Terra, her Spectre-hood. Hannah had watched her daughter's career with the proud consternation of the parent being eclipsed by the offspring.

"Probably for the best. It was a long time ago."

"Thank you - for the company and the invitation."

Chakwas just smiled. "Anytime, Hannah."

"Anytime, huh?"

An eyebrow shot up. "Yes, anytime."

"Want to grab coffee tomorrow?" Hannah didn't know that she had all the emotional energy for a new relationship - but this wasn't really new, was it? It'd be nice to have someone to talk to. Someone to lean on.

"11 o'clock?"

"That works."

"I'll see you tomorrow."

Hannah watched her walk away, then returned to her empty apartment and her churning memories.

* * *

A/N: Written for Spectre Requisitions 2018 on AO3.


	6. One Last Party

"You know…"

Shepard looked up from her datapad (another depressing list of ships lost and lives reduced to a number) to see her girlfriend standing in the doorway of her cabin. It was nice to take off the 'ex' modifier from that.

She set the datapad down. "What's up?"

Ash took a few steps over to Shepard's desk to press her lips briefly to the corner of her mouth. The desk beside her - their - bed was more or less Ashley's now. Sometimes though, they did their paperwork on the lounge do they could press shoulders together or rest legs in laps.

Shepard hadn't realised just how much she'd missed easy affection until she'd had it again.

As she pulled away Ash said, "tomorrow is Christmas."

Emilia blinked and glanced at her terminal screen - and the date. "Oh."

How long had it been since she'd had Christmas - a real one? Four years? No, five. Before Eden Prime, when she'd been commander of Ghost Squadron in the Traverse. They'd decorated their part of the base in tinsel (to the local Regimental Sergeant Major's disgust) and stuck reindeer horns on their scout vehicle. The Gunny had even somehow rustled up some honest to god Christmas ham.

It felt like another life.

"I'm guessing you'll want the day off to spend with your family." Her chest twisted for a moment with a thought of her mother and brother - then released. She'd become an expert at shoving anything besides the war aside.

"Yeah, but…" Ash paused before putting her hand on her shoulder. Shepard tilted her head back to look at her, "my mom's invited you."

Shepard blinked in surprise. "I didn't know your mother knew about us."

Ash smiled wryly, "Neither did I."

Shepard chuckled at that until she faded into seriousness, "Do you want me to come?"

"Of course I do," the answer was prompt but still coated with an edge of uncertainty, "But I know you're very busy. No pressure."

This was obviously important to her. And, Shepard found, it was important to her too. A moment for them - a normal couple moment - when their relationship was so often squeezed into the gaps in between operations and duties and briefings.

She shrugged, "I can take a day off. Ship needs some repair work done anyway - that starboard shield generator is still playing up. But uh… You know it's been a while since I've 'met the parents'."

"She'll love you," Ash insisted stubbornly, "Everyone loves you. "

Shepard rolled her eyes, "Enough people have tried to kill me that I know _that's_ not true."

"Just be your normal, charming 'I'm on recruiting posters' self and don't freak out. I mean, I had to meet _your_ mother. My sisters are probably going to threaten you, but just pretend to be intimidated or something."

"Pretend?"

Ash raised an eyebrow at her. "You're Commander Shepard, babe. N7 Marine, Spectre. Fought a Reaper - "

"Two Reapers."

Ashley rolled her eyes, " _Two_ Reapers on foot. I think you can handle my sisters. Lynn cried once because I killed a spider."

"Yeah but Reapers aren't the people you care about most," she admitted quietly, looking at her hands. If she were honest, most people were the most exciting of puzzles to Emilia Shepard. Puzzles to be solved. Their motivations teased out. But she couldn't look at the sisters and mother Ash adored like that.

Ashley's expression gentled. "I love you, dork. That's what they'll care about."

Shepard breathed out and raised her head, "Alright. I'll tell everyone to only call me for emergencies tomorrow."

"And this afternoon," Ash added, "still got to get presents.

* * *

Being out of uniform felt off, as if she was wearing someone else's clothes. She'd had so few civilian clothes that they'd made a stop to buy something for her to wear to the Williams Family Christmas Party. Most of the clothes she'd bought in a fit of spite after she woke up in a Cerberus lab had been left behind on Earth and it hadn't seemed necessary to replace them when she was in uniform most of the time.

But while it felt strange, it also felt a little freeing. Like she'd taken off a little weight for a day.

Of course, it'd been replaced with a bubbling of anxiety in her gut. She hadn't Met The Family since Rita, and that relationship had gone down in flames before the SR1 had its keel laid down.

Ashley seemed to find it funny, "You've met them before."

"Yeah, but that was different." 2183, after Saren. When Ashley still wore chevrons and all they were supposed to be to each other was Commander and subordinate.

Ash grinned at her across the dim interior of the taxi. "You're a dork."

Emilia drew herself up, "Am not."

"Sure you are," she leaned across to brush their lips together, her hand resting on Emilia's hip. Her touch was the smoulder warmth of tamped coals as she lingered. Shepard shivered under her lips, remembering waking that morning - Christmas morning - to her girlfriend's warm hands and mouth, childish indignation slipping away.

The sky car came to a stop and they gathered up the presents. Each label read 'From Ash and Emilia' and writing them out had been a surprising thrill each time.

Mariana Williams and her two middle daughters lived in the refugee camp, amongst the rest of the remnants of Amaterasu. Sarah Williams had an apartment on the Wards, near the hospital she worked at. Ashley had spent a fair bit of her shore leave helping her mother decorate and construct their temporary home.

And it showed. The Williams residence might not be the warm brick house on Amaterasu - it might just be some shipping containers hollowed out and joined together, but it had been painted and a garden built against the front. Tinsel and lights covered the metal.

Ashley almost bounced to the door. Her clear excitement warmed Shepard to the bone as she trailed in her wake. Sometimes she thought they'd both forgotten what peace looked like - it was really something to see her _happy._

She banged on the door, "Mãe! Feliz natal!"

The door swung open and Ash was gathered up in a ferocious hug by a shorter, elegant woman in a _very_ festive dress.

"Go put your presents under the tree," Mariana Williams Rodrigues ordered before turning to Shepard, brown eyes the same colour as Ashley's sharp.

"Feliz Navidad, ma'am." Shepard said - before she was seized in a firm hug.

"None of that 'ma'am' nonsense," she said briskly, pulling back before Shepard could pull herself out of her instinctive flinch or work out what to do with her hands. "you will call me Mariana. Where are you from?"

Shepard blinked. "I'm a spacer, but my family is Argentinian and Australian."

"Mamãe!" Ash returned, bereft of presents, "At least let her in the door before you start the Inquisition."

Her hand was warm on the small of Shepard's back - for once not cautious of open affection, of who might see - as she drew her inside.

"I'm just getting to know her," Mariana insisted, "You never bring anyone home!"

"Sure, I do."

"No, you don't." A new voice. A woman, roughly 27, wrapped in a long flowing dress, with Ashley's nose but none of her hardness. "At least, not since your high school boyfriend."

"That counts!"

"It really doesn't." They hugged, the younger woman tucking her head under Ash's chin.

"You must be Abby," Shepard said, shaking her hand once the sisters separated.

Abby had a dreamer's eyes, a clear brown that seemed to be looking right through you. "That's me. And you must be Commander Shepard."

"Just Shepard is fine."

For such a small space, they'd made the living room of the makeshift house into something special. Christmas music was playing softly in the background and there was an honest to god pine tree in the corner with presents piled beneath, spreading a warm, green smell throughout the house, and a nativity scene valances on a box turned table. The Williams were a military family, a colonial family. They knew the how to make do.

"You're already met Sarah," Ash pointed people out to her,, "over there's Lynn and there's Abby's husband, Han. Everyone, this is my partner Emilia."

"I think everyone knows who she is, Ash," Sarah said dryly. Ash waved a hand at her dismissively.

* * *

Shepard was leaning against a wall, watching Ash twirl Lynn around to the sound of Christmas carols, when Abby slid up next to her, eggnog in hand.

"So… this is serious this time?"

She couldn't blame Abby for her caution. In the long, halting conversation she and Ash had before they'd gotten back together - laying all the cards on the table - she'd told Shepard that Abby was the sister she'd leant on after Alchera. The only one she'd told about their relationship and the open comm line.

Even so.

"Always has been," she admitted. The Emilia Shepard of four years ago hadn't risked her career for a one night stand or fling.

"She was heartbroken, you know," Abby's eyes were fierce with love and protectiveness.

"I know," she said regretfully, watching the laughter dance over Ash's face. "I love her, and I never meant to put her in that position."

On the other side of a barrel of a gun. Love and friendship warring with duty.

"Well, I'd threaten to break your kneecaps or something suitably dramatic if you hurt her again, but you can probably kill someone with a toothpick, so." Abby shrugged.

Shepard smirked slightly, "I'll lend you the bat."

"What?" Abby blinked.

"The bat to break my kneecaps. If I hurt her again."

Ashley chose that moment to make a beeline for them, wrapping an arm around Shepard shoulder, and kissing her on the cheek, "Hey babe, you two having fun?"

"I was giving Shepard the shovel talk," Abby said cheerily.

"Abby!"

"I'm pretty sure your girlfriend can defend herself."

"I dunno," Shepard smiled, "I've heard you're good with a sword." She slid an arm around Ashes waist, enjoying the solid warmth of her.

"Sure, if you break my sister's heart I'll just challenge you to a duel," Abby said with mock solemnity.

"Has to be high noon, of course," Shepard added, nodding wisely.

"Glad you two are getting along, but I'll defend my own honour, thanks." Ash said, deadpan, then tugged on Emilia's hand, " C'mon, ma's about to serve dinner. I bet even you'll be too full to move afterwards."

"Challenge accepted." she let Ash pull her towards the table, deeper into warmth and laughter.


	7. Comet

The six Marines and sailors are silent. Two wear the blinding white of the Navy, four the near black blue of the Marine Corps. Four of them wear blood stripes down one arm. They stand in two rows, a coffin between them of deep mahogany, the lid almost complete covered in metal pins - little gold knives piercing through black lettering - N7.

The flag has been sharply folded, three old-fashioned gunpowder shells slipped in between soft blue, and pressed into the white-gloved hands of Captain Hannah Shepard, whose eyes fix somewhere no one else can see.

Lieutenant Ashley Williams' ears are ringing still, and she's not sure whether it's from the honor guard's three volleys or the _slap_ of each N7 on the cargo deck of the SSV _Everest_ driving their insignia pins into the top of the coffin.

"All hands, bury the dead!" Anderson's voice booms but a crack runs down the middle of it.

The weight on her shoulder is far too light when she and the other five lift the casket onto their shoulders and slowly pace to the airlock chamber and gently slid it inside. There was a viewing port and Ashley is frozen staring out of it.

For the month since that awful day, she had been consumed by a roaring fire. A rage that scorched her from the inside out and hurt and lashed out at anyone whom could be assigned a scrap of blame. Joker, the captain who'd refused to stay and search, Anderson. Now the flames have flickered and died.

"We therefore commit this body to the void, looking for the resurrection of the body when the stars shall give up their dead, and the life of the world to come, through our Lord Jesus Christ."

Ashley wants to laugh with the insanity of it. There is no body, just some leaden weights in the bottom. Instead she watches as the coffin that has no piece of Emilia Shepard within it shoots out into space and towards the nearest cold-burning star.

"O God, whose mercies cannot be numbered: accept our prayers on behalf of thy servant Emilia, and grant her an entrance into the land of light and joy, in the fellowship of thy saints; through Jesus Christ thy Son our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen."

Shepard had been a terrible Catholic, Ashley thinks. She would have been annoyed to be called by her first name.

 _So Eden sank to grief,_  
 _So dawn goes down to day._  
 _Nothing gold can stay._

There were people who burnt so brightly you couldn't help but watch them. Try to edge closer to their warmth. But sometimes they burnt out all too quickly.

She thinks she can see a flash of light in the midst of the deep dark as the coffin begins to burn. The last flash of Shepard's brilliance, fading.

"Good night, dear heart;" Ashley Williams whispers to the glass, "Good night, good night."


	8. Field Galaxy

The house was built of a dark timber native to Terra Nova, and tucked away from the rest of the small town down a long, quiet road. The townspeople who would pass by to drop off vegetables or have a coffee always pressed the button beside the gate and waited for the invitation to come in. These days it always came - but that hadn't always been the case.

Respect and trust were two sides of the same coin.

As she had for four months, Emilia Shepard woke alone in that small, timber house in a soft double bed that was nothing like an Alliance Navy sleeper pod. It was 9 am and she had nothing she had to do. She stretched, feeling the aches that would never again leave her in her thigh and spine but enjoying the feel of the soft sheets and blankets against her skin.

After ten minutes of flickering in and out of sleep, she reached over and fixed her prosthetic arm into the implant embedded in the stump of her bicep and put on her omnitool. There were messages on there - there always were. But they were no longer demanding things from her, demanding she place yet another weight on buckled and bleeding shoulders. They instead told her that there was a faculty meeting on Tuesday and that a dozen friends were trying their best to do the correspondence thing - an effort she appreciated with a soft smile and a quick reply.

Ashley had sent an email, as she always did when she had a chance. She told her funny things her troops had done, the unclassified details because she knew Shepard would never hold what she couldn't say against her, that she was safe and a bit bored to be honest. A quote from a favourite poem that Shepard murmured to herself in the quiet of their bedroom; and a reminder that Ashley loved her.

Shepard had heard people say that saying 'I love you' too much made it lose its meaning, but she'd watched too many people she loved die to believe that. Every time she and her wife parted, they said it, whether it was just Shepard going to work or Ashley deploying. The words no longer had the desperation they'd had during the war, during that last terrible fight when Shepard could feel the ring on her dogtag chain pressing a bruise into her chest under her armour.

But she didn't think they'd ever forget.

The war was always there, living inside them alongside the knowledge that neither of them were invincible, that death was as much about luck as it was skill, but these it was quieter. They were learning to live around it, how to strip each other of the hardness they had learnt to survive, to seek out the soft places and delicate dreams of peace with hands calloused by guns and knives and violence.

War had sculpted Emilia Shepard, but it wasn't everything she was.

She was safe. She was free. She hadn't fired a gun in anger in five years.

The table beside the bed was stacked with poetry books and a datapad with a recording on it. Even when Ashley wasn't here, she fell asleep listening to Rumi in the rise and fall of her lover's voice.

Shepard levered herself out of bed gingerly, careful of her body's protests, and went to find coffee. She sipped it, dark and hot, as she fed the dog and then the chickens, humming to herself as she spread the seeds to the sound of their clucks.

The outside sun was already warm enough that sweat popped on her forehead. She liked the heat, the way it scorched the cold from her bones. She picked up the hose and began to water the flowers that clustered in riots of pink and orange and purple and red, her dog lying at her feet, ever vigilant so she didn't need to be.

Later, she would make the careful, slow walk down to the cafe run by a woman who had left behind Earth but brought her latte art with her, where her seat in the corner where she could sit with her back to the wall was always free and no one would blink at the quiet woman in the back who always had a pistol on her hip. The owner might come over to talk and together they might marvel at the miracle that was the owner's grandson - a little boy who would never know the Reapers - and Shepard might touch his soft downy hair. She might think this meant far more than platitudes or worship or statues - this evidence that life went on. That the pain had meant something, in the end.

For now, Emilia Shepard was alone and she tilted her her face to the sky and felt the warmth wash across her skin, her fingers curled into the dog's thick fur.


	9. Loss Adjacent

The last time Ashley Williams had been in Joughin, it'd been for a funeral. Now the streets were littered with the debris of battle and what had been a park was now her unit's defensive line - foxholes dug into gardens, overturned picnic furniture and skycars used for cover. On the other side of a swing set she saw the flash of Cerberus white as she crouched behind the barricade.

Then she heard it - an all too familiar whistling sound.

"Get down-" Ash's voice was swallowed by the sound of the mortar round impacting - the roar of the explosion, the whistling of shrapnel, the thud of clumps of dirt falling back to earth. For a moment she thought _this is it._

This was how she died, on a planet far from where she was born. Killed by the Illusive Man's little side-show to the real war.

Then she was on her back, looking up at the yellow-orange Benning sky, legs throbbing in time to her heartbeat. Ash forced herself to sit up and looked down. A few pieces of shrapnel had sliced through her shields and armour, leaving bloody gouges in her upper leg.

 _Ow._

She could hear the low groaning of wounded.

"Williams!" Vega was suddenly looming over her, a mountain in Alliance blue armour, "You alright?"

"Yeah, yeah." She pulled a tube of medigel out of her kit and started smearing it over the shrapnel wounds, "Casrep?"

"No one's dead," he said simply, "but we've got three seriously wounded. Ling wants to evacuate them."

The mission had been simple on paper. Ash, Vega and the rest of the _Normandy's_ Marines had formed a blocking position to blunt the Cerberus advance while Shepard and the others evacuated civilians with the help of the local resistance fighters. Shepard was still running into pockets of Cerberus troops but if the Marines didn't hold, she'd be drowning in them.

Shepard had paused, before they'd started loading up for the drop. She'd paused, her eyes tracing the lines of Ashley's face like she'd wanted to say something. But all she'd said was _good hunting._

It was easier when they were fighting together.

"Boomer!" she shouted as she grabbed Vega's arm, levering herself to her feet. The medigel mercifully numbed her leg.

Lance Corporal Klein, better known as Boomer, appeared. "Ma'am?"

She jerked a thumb at a van left abandoned on the street. "Reckon you can hotwire it?"

"Uh. Yes. Ma'am."

Before the Reaper invasion, Klein's auto theft charges would've kept him out of the Marines. Now they were taking anyone who could hold a rifle. She was just glad his particular skills were useful right now.

"Do it. Vega, make sure the wounded get loaded into it and taken to the LZ." From the LZ Cortez would be able to pick them up and ferry them back to the _Normandy_ and Chakwas' medbay.

He hesitated. "You're hurt too."

"I'm fine. Go on."

"Boss won't be happy."

Ash scowled at him. "She can yell at me for it later. Get moving."

As soon as he was gone she turned back to reorganising the defensive line and scanning her tacmap. She was going to blow the _fuck_ out of that Cerberus mortar.

* * *

 _"Ow."_

"Stop squirming," Chakwas said calmly, the cold light of the medbay glinting off the forceps she was using to pick little bits of metal out of Ash's leg. "This wouldn't be so bad if you'd gotten treatment when it happened and not three hours later."

"I was busy!" Ash protested and then yelped as the doctor pulled another sliver of metal out.

"Marines," Chakwas said with fond resignation. Once the last bits of shrapnel were out she efficiently stitched up the worst of the wounds, dressed them and then subjected Ash to a now familiar lecture on wound care.

"Thanks, Doc, you're the best-"

"I believe the Commander wished to speak with you. She's in her quarters."

"...right. Yeah."

She took the elevator up to Deck One with some trepidation. Not out of any real fear Shepard was going to shout at her - she wasn't from the yelling school of leadership (more the quiet-but-excruciating-disappointment school) and if anyone could understand staying in the field with your people, it was Shepard.

No, it wasn't that.

On the field it was easy. They were two Marines who got each other's thinking, who watched each other's sixes. They were commander and subordinate, interactions guided by efficient respect and understanding. Out of the field, the ground was less stable.

'Friends' didn't quite encapsulate the whole 'ex-lovers who were in an armed stand off not even two months ago' thing. Or the fact that Ash could admit to herself that she was still in love with Emilia Shepard.

Shepard was behind her desk, typing away at her terminal. Her dark hair was wet from the shower, sticking up in spikes. Ash's fingers itched to smooth through it - she clasped her hands behind her back instead.

"Commander?"

Shepard turned. Her jaw was a hard line of tension. "How're you feeling?"

"I'm alright. Couple of stitches but I'll heal."

Shepard's eyes darted away from hers, shoulders squared just like whenever she had to go in front of the Council. "Good to hear."

Ashley was too tired to try and interpret whatever was going on. "Skipper?"

A tremor ran through Shepard's tense figure. "I heard the mortar round hit, and then over comms that you were hurt and..." She breathed out, rubbing a hand across her face. "For a moment there...it was Mars all over again."

Ash's throat closed. She didn't remember much of the Mars mission - side effect of the brain injury, the doctors said. But Shepard clearly did. "I'm okay."

Shepard shrugged, smiling weakly, "Guess that fucked me up more than I thought it had. I nearly lost you, and I couldn't - I couldn't stop it. I just watched it happen."

"You haven't lost me," Ash insisted, taking a step closer.

Shepard's eyes met hers, something close to resignation lurking in them. "Haven't I?"

And God, Ash was sick of trying to tiptoe through this grey area between them, of holding back from what she still wanted - what she hoped they both still wanted. Her voice came out a hoarse whisper. "Kiss me."

For a moment the words hung between them - long enough for Ash to consider whether she'd misread Shepard completely, whether she'd just fucked up their still fragile working relationship - and then Shepard's hands were cradling her face, thumbs stroking along her jawline, and they were kissing.

Kissing Shepard was both familiar and unfamiliar. She felt the same, tasted the same but the lip and chin scars Ash had liked to run her mouth over were gone, replaced by slashes of raw red across her cheekbones.

It felt like discovering something and coming home all at once.

She pressed her hand into Shepard's shoulder blade, felt the shift of her muscle beneath her uniform jacket, as Shepard pressed into her with her whole body - until Ash's back hit the bulkhead.

Shepard pulled back, pressing their foreheads together.

"Miss me?" Ash teased, running her hand down Shepard's spine.

"You have no idea," Shepard murmured and kissed her again.


End file.
